Jon
Kennedy, Nanty Glo Home Page webmaster and owner, is a former teen and campus
minister. He began his journalism career as teen columnist for the Nanty Glo Journal
and its sister weekly newspapers from 1957 to '62 and became the Journal's
third editor in 1962 at age 20. He has edited other newspapers and magazines,
and more recently, webzines, ever since. His articles have appeared in the Los
Angeles Times, Detroit Free Press, Cleveland Plain-Dealer, Christianity
Today, and many other publications. His Jonals appear here each Monday, Wednesday,
and Friday.

St. Paul's Gospel
(Gospel and politics, 3)

I've now finished
reading Anglican Bishop N. T. Wright's book, What Saint Paul Really Said: Was
Paul of Tarsus the Real Founder of Christianity? An Oxford University scholar
and one of the newest bishops in the Church of England, Wright challenges all
those who propose that the real (what they call the "historical") Jesus, unlike
the Jesus presented in the New Testament, has been hidden by the church, which
would surely make that scheme the most successful and far-reaching conspiracy
in history.

The "Jesus of History," depending
on which "theological history" book claiming to present him you read,
took the prostitute Mary Magdalene as his wife or was the gay lover of "John the
beloved," or perhaps both, or was a magician, a political zealot, or any of myriad
other variations, except the one that the New Testament claims, the Messiah of
Israel who fulfilled all the law and the prophets. Though such claims have been
made since the first century (by "gnostics," some of whose claims are even confronted
in the New Testament itself), the preponderance of scientific (unlike "theological")
historical studies hold that the evidence for the New Testament accounts of Jesus
is as reliable as any historical proof of anything that happened so long ago.
Not only are the New Testament texts as well documented and carefully transmitted
over the millenia as any other ancient texts, there are also numerous "secular"
references to Jesus and the early Christians that support the church's account,
either incidentally or intentionally, like those of the Roman/Jewish historian
Josephus.

Wright's answer to the question
in his title is, "No, Jesus Christ, not Paul, is the founder of Christianity."
Paul, though the most eloquent and prolific of the New Testament authors, says
nothing inconsistent with the authors of the gospels, Acts, and the other epistles
that make up that book, no matter how imaginative and creative the revisionist
interpretations of Paul and the other writers made by "theological historians"
may be.

It is heartening to find such
an affirmation of the unbroken testimony and the consensus of the church in a
communion (Anglican) that is beset by modernist attempts to upset the standards
and pull up the anchors. It seems that every Easter the British press publish
results of another survey of Anglican clergy men and women that finds many of
them disbelieve in the resurrection of Christ and, by extension, His deity. This
year, the British state church has been beset by the appointment of a self-proclaimed
gay man as a bishop, and just weeks after his appointment was upset in a church
higher court, its American counterpart, the Episcopal church, followed suit, except
that the American appointment has been confirmed rather than overturned (though
it has not yet become final as of this writing).

Those
of us who believe that the faith of the apostles and teachings of Christ have
been preserved most faithfully in Greek (Orthodox) or Roman (Catholic) communions
can still appreciate that on the broad scope of Christian teachings and traditions,
even those who profess the faith but depart from our traditions preserve and are
willing to take risks and ridicule to stand for truth. This is the case, though
sad to say in some denominations only among minorities, not only of some in Anglicanism
like Wright, but in Lutheranism and most of the other Protestant denominations.

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